Skyguide, the air traffic controller at major airports in Switzerland, has confirmed that it will be restricting the number of take-offs and landings at both Zurich and Geneva until further notice. The company will also be launching a new task force, after a software glitch on July 5 led to multiple flight cancellations.

Zurich airspace restricted on July 5 thanks to air traffic control bug

In a statement given to CH Media, Skyguide confirmed that on Friday afternoon its air traffic control system briefly broke down. Thanks to a bug in the software, departures and arrivals into Zurich were heavily restricted for an hour and a half.

As a result, 18 take-offs and 19 landings had to be cancelled, with delays of up to two hours affecting 31 services, Zurich Airport told Keystone-ATS. The latest breakdown tops off a number of other incidents where issues at Skyguide have severely disrupted flight operations. The most severe of which came in June 2022, when a technical malfunction saw Swiss airspace close completely for several hours. 

A third of flight delays in Zurich and Geneva blamed on technical problems

Speaking to CH Media, Skyguide spokesperson Vladi Barrosa admitted that technical problems with its air traffic control systems were responsible for a third of delays in Zurich and Geneva so far this year, though the weather remains the most common source of disruption. "Congestion has a major impact on our system," SWISS spokesperson Oliver Buchhofer told Watson. 

Barrosa confirmed that a new task force had been set up following the incident on July 5. What’s more, they confirmed that they would be extending restrictions on air traffic in Zurich and Geneva.

Flight operations in Geneva and Zurich restricted until further notice

The measures, admitted to by Skyguide in April, have restricted take-offs, landings and planes flying over both airports by 20 percent, and were originally intended to end in early June. However, Barrosa now admitted that “the capacity reduction is maintained until further notice”, giving no indication as to when full operations will be restored. 

While the decision will not automatically lead to flight cancellations, the limiting of flight operations means that the airport does not have as much capacity to deal with disruption when it occurs, making delayed and cancelled flights more likely. Barrosa explained that while multiple software updates “have been successful and have helped stabilise the system… We believe it is necessary to maintain this buffer for the time being.”

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